Dr. Baterana hands over Mulago hospital management to Dr. Byanyima

By Ben Musanje

9^th March 2022

Embattled Mulago Hospital Executive Director, Dr. Baterana Byarugaba has handed over office to his deputy, Dr. Rosemary Byanyima during a brief function held at Mulago Hospital.

Byarugaba’s woes started last week when he was arrested by the Statehouse Health Monitoring Unit led by Dr Warren Namara and later charged at Jinja Road Police with 4 counts of embezzlement, abuse of office, fraudulent false accounting and causing financial loss contrary to section 23 of Anti-Corruption act.

Dr Namara said Dr. Baterana alias BB is being investigated for mismanaging Shs28 billion.

Against that backdrop, the Permanent Secretary Ministry of Health Dr Diana Atwine interdicted Dr. Baterana from duty and instructed him to immediately hand over office to his deputy and step aside to allow law take its course.

During the handover ceremony, Dr. Baterana said he was proud of the changes he initiated at the hospital for the last 11 years among them the first oxygen plant in Uganda since independence that was established in 2012 moving away from the imported oxygen from Kenya and the same facilities were extended to Kawempe and Kiruddu hospitals.

He was also proud of the dialysis section that was made simple that the country now boasts of over 60 dialysis machines at Mulago, Kiruddu and four for specialized services, construction of staff quarters first ever for the Mulago hospital that also helped to fight off land grabbers and the construction of a specialized women hospital of 453 bed capacity and 11 operating theatres.

This was planned as a maternal unit of the Mulago hospital but was later made a hospital of its own among other achievements.

He also mentioned the ongoing renovation works for Mulago including the equipping and increasing the number of Intensive care unit and high dependency unit beds.

Despite the achievements, Dr. Baterana said there are some challenges that he said will continue hindering proper service delivery at the national referral hospital like limited budget where half of the budget goes into salaries, pension and gratuity, need to improve on remuneration for the health workers to make them confertable and they don’t yearn for private clinic services outside the hospital.

The incoming Acting Mulago Executive Director, Dr. Rosemary Byanyima said she will emphasize team work if Mulago is to win public trust and confidence.

The Health Ministry undersecretary, Kenneth Akiira who represented the Permanent Secretary hailed Dr.Baterana for registering several successes for the national referral hospital and assured him of their support in the ongoing investigations against him.